Green is the new black, darlings

Celebrities have developed a mania for all things ecologically sound. But don't count on it saving the planet, says Rosie Millard

As celebrity crazes go, this latest one is reasonably harmless: not hard-core drinking, drug-taking or even excessive slimming. No, the current fad for celebs who make a living out of appearing on the covers of Heat magazine is nothing other than knobbly vegetables. And free-range pigs. Fried up, that is, with some organic onion rings.

“Green” food, grown without pesticides or hormones, is so hot at the moment that no right-minded member of Soho House would dare to throw a dinner party without a slab of organic fare on the menu.

It seems as though the rest of us have also been smitten by greenery. Slowly but surely it has become de rigueur to recycle stuff, rather than just chuck it away. The government has set statutory targets for the recycling and recovery of household waste; across the nation, two-tone bin systems outside residential homes with paper, bottles and boxes